What Just Happened?

News & Horrors from the last two weeks

Greetings Saskatoon friends, well what a couple of weeks it’s been, huh? Let’s throw some random recent news on the table and see if we can make any sense of it. Here we go! /Stephen Whitworth

THE SASK. PARTY DISCOVERS EXCITING NEW LEVELS OF UNPOPULARITY

That’s highly relative; a lot of political parties would be thrilled to have 44 per cent of voters supporting them. Still, the Saskatchewan Party usually floats above 50 per cent. This budget — packed with cuts and bad ideas, and sprung on an outraged province without consultation — has done a number on the Brad Wall brand. I suspect the reversal of library cuts will help the Sask. Party a bit; still, a sagging economy and growing awareness of just how badly these bunglers botched the Saskaboom does not bode well for this government’s future. And it’s not likely that Charisma Brad will stick around to lead them to the polls in 2020.

BOO BIGOTS

I spend way too much time on Western separatist Facebook pages and let me tell you, the sort of people who want Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia to secede from Canada are not the sharpest, most tolerant bunch you’ll encounter on the Internet. That said, at least those clowns have the good manners to spend their hate-time in their basements. Unlike, for example, the Toronto parents who’ve been showing up at Peel District School Board meetings to rip up Korans and yell anti-Muslim slogans. These solid citizens are flipping out over schools giving Muslim students prayer space (which has been going on for decades but is only lately trendy among haters). Look, I’m as opposed to school prayer as the next atheist but if Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu or Wiccan students worship on school premises on their own time I can (grudgingly) live with it. As long as it’s not disruptive, live and let live I say. But when the Globe And Mail reports that opposition to Muslim prayer has sparked death threats and calls to burn mosques, well, come on, who’s the fanatic now?

GIRAFFES ARE PROBABLY ENDANGERED IN THE WILD?

The Guardian reported that five conservation groups asked the United States to list the animals as endangered because wild giraffe populations are crashing. The culprits: habitat loss, poaching and disease. Well, that’s juuuust super. What a world.

BYE-BYE BILL O’REILLY

The popular Fox News host-slash-despicable human finally succumbed to long-festering, self-inflicted PR wounds this month. Yes, Bill O’Reilly is out, thanks to his alleged history of alleged sexual harassment and the a-lot-more-than-alleged exodus of advertisers from his show. See? The world isn’t always a terrible place.

NORTH KOREAN NUKES AND THIN-SKINNED, EGOMANIACAL OOMPA-LOOMPA: WHAT COULD GO WRONG?

I’m not even thinking about this and neither should you. Doo de doot! ❧